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Mill Run F03-2193 





PS 1663 
I.F65 P3 | 
Copy 1 




AN IRISH IDYL. 



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Copyright, i8y8, by J. Dudley Ferguson. 



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DDY'8 WIF 

AN IRISH IDYL 




Have you heard the story of Paddy's wife, 

The beautiful Miss McSharey ; 
Who ran the machine the whole of her life, 

In frollicksome Tipper ny ? 
How Pat the rollicking broth of a boy, 

So handy with his shillaly, 
Found out that the angel who shared his joy. 

Was worse than the ould boy raily ? 

You hav'nt ! Well stranger you've something to larn, 

Said Mickey, the old switch-tender ; 
There by the track, a flag under his arm, 

Red, like his nose, I remember. 
Jist come over here and squat on these ties, 

In the shade of the signal box ; 
No ! 'gainst the rules. Well ! a drop 'bout the size, 

Of three fingers used to hard knocks. 

Say boss, that was stiff ! You just bet your life, 

When I was a boy in Athlone, 
We knew how it worked, with gaugers at strife, 

Distilling for widow Mahone. 
Why boss we — Oh, the story ! Well young man 

There was fun at that disclosure ; 
For the frightened Pat, like a spalpeen, ran 

From this feminine bulldozer. 

Faith sir, he'd been married a week or less, 

When the Priest on his way to mass, 
Found him stretched on his back in great distress, 

Stowed-away in his neighbors grass. 
Both his eyes were blacked, and his head was cracked, 

And his blooming nose was askew ; 
In every respect he looked as if whacked, 

By a band of the hostile sioux. 







Why Patsy, you rascal, the priest exclaimed, 

You are dhrunk again 1 declare ; 
Och ! You ould baste, I am grieved, I'm ashamed, 

To see you lie wallowing there. 
Only last sunday, you carried your bride, 

So swate, from steps of the altar ; 
Don't say a word ! I've a good mind, your hide 

To curse, by saint and by psalter. 

Be aisy a minuit — don't say too much, 

Says Pat wid a look of surprise ; 
I have'nt been drinking, nor fighting, nor such, 

If any man says so he lies. 
And your riv'rince knows I respect the cloth, 

To the priest I'm always civil ; 
But that lady you metioned in your wroth, 

Could flure the author of evil. 

She's worse I repate than the grim ould boy, 

Who has charge of the fires below, 
My raison for saying so is the how, 

Or the fact I'm going to show. 
Its thrue I was only three weeks at school, 

And my head's not crazed with larnin ; 
But unless you stretched it Father O 'Toole, 

Keep still ! I'll quote from your sarmon. 

You said : The Bible declares on its face, 

If satan we'd only resist — 
Now mind ! He would flee from you in disgrace, 

And with that you brought down your fist. 
Its true, I believe, resist and he'll flee 

From you, the same words wirra sthrue : 
But my wife, if you only resist, she 

Will, be japers, she'll flee at you. 








Entered According to Act of Congress, in the year 1878, by 

/. DUDLEY FERGUSON, 



rife In the Office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington, D. C. ^ 






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pH 8.5 

Mill Run F03-2193 



